The Words I Couldn’t Say…

“What I should have said just wouldn’t pass my lipsSo I held back and now we’ve come to this…I should have found the way to tell you how I feltNow the only one I’m telling is myself…All I can hear in the silence that remainsAre the words I couldn’t say.”

Rascal Flatts, Words I Couldn’t Say

I have Postnatal Depression.

It’s over 2 years since Reuben was born and this is the first time I am publicity admitting it. It’s been a long road to get here. In truth, I knew when I was pregnant that something wasn’t ‘right’. But there was so much else going on with my antenatal heath (which you can read about here) that I didn’t have the time or energy to face it. I wonder how different things be now, if I had?

It hit me like a ton of bricks, as soon as Reuben was born. After my c-section, when they handed me my baby to hold, the only reaction I would muster was “Oh”. It felt surreal, but not in a good way. Not in a “oh my goodness I’ve just met Brad Paisley” way, in a “this is not my baby” way. As the visitors left Reuben and I alone in the hospital ward, the darkness set in. Fear. I was utterly terrified. I knew in my heart that “this wasn’t going to work”. I looked at Reuben and felt nothing except a desire to turn back the clock. He lay asleep in the plastic crib and I lay awake, texting a friend who was up feeding her 2 month old baby, hoping that some of her excitement would rub off on me. It didn’t.

My first night home, as I sat on the sofa chatting with Gavin, Mum and Dad, I had to resist the urge to hand Reuben to them and walk out the door and never come back. I angrily told myself – “tough luck, you got yourself into this mess, you’ll just have to put up with it”.

So that’s what I tried to do. I learned how to practically care for Reuben, telling myself soon all the other feelings would flood in. They didn’t. So I read every blog and forum I could find online, with other mums who were saying some of the “awful” things I could not bear to vocalise to anyone else. I rationalised that even if I didn’t feel a bond with him, all I did for him was me showing care and concern, and that’s what he needed most. When the disconnection, I felt towards him, was so deep that I feared what might come next, I told myself that I don’t believe that love is all about mushy feelings, it’s a choice, an act of will, so I would ‘choose to love him’ no matter how I felt. Still none of that worked to fill the dark hole that was inside of me.

I guess if you my other previous blogs , it might not come as a big shock to you that I was struggling, I knew that too, but I didn’t know that what actually had was PND.

You might be wondering why I didn’t just speak out and tell someone. Well I did. Two people, in fact. When Reuben was between the ages of 2 and 4 months, I spoke to two medical professionals, both woman. I had to summon the courage to do so. Both of their reactions were far from helpful – one rolled her eyes and said “You’ve just had a baby, what do you expect, you’re all over the place”, the other asked “Is it because your baby is so badly behaved that you feel this way?”. I was gutted. So that lead me further down the path, as I began to assume this is “just me”. That there was something internally flawed about me that meant I couldn’t be a mum. And once again, having got both Reuben and I into this dreadful situation, I’d just have to deal with it.

So that’s what I have been trying to do for the last 2 years. And it has made me very ill. I have severe Postnatal Depression. For the last 8 months, it has even made me very physically unwell to the point where I have wondered (as has Gavin) if I have another serious illness. I have had some very dark days and weeks, I have been living under a cloud of death for too long.

Back in September, just in time for Reuben’s second birthday, I was diagnosed. Since then, I have started talking antidepressants, seeing a Psychiatrist and meeting regularly with a good friend, who has years of experience of working with mums who have PND.

I am on the road to recovery. It’s going to take time and a lot of it. But each day is a little bit of a step up, rather than a leap further down.

I’ve decided to share my journey on my blog, in a sense to break the silence there is around mental illness, especially this one, which many of us worry “makes us a bad mum and a rubbish person”. Reading other people’s truth has been a lifeline to me, so if this helps even just one other mum feel not so alone and that someone understands, it’s definitely worth it.

If you come back here again over the next few weeks, you’ll read more of my story. I hope to share the mental, emotional and physically effects of PND, the depths of despair it can lead you to, my experience of the AD’s and treatment, and things that are helping me to move forward. If you’ve read my blog in the past, I realise focusing on this topic, for the next few weeks, might mean it’s not that relevant for you – I will move forward from it once again.

If you are currently struggling with PND, you’ll find lots of support, under the ‘Help with PND’ tab, all of which I have used to help and encourage myself these past 2 years.

I have struggled to admit and accept that I have PND for too long, for too long I have lived in silence and fear. For too long there have been countless “words I couldn’t say”. That stops now. So, let me share my illness and my road to recovery with you…

Lindsay, I both thank you and admire you for sharing. I also want you to know I hear such strength in the words – “I am on the road to recovery. It’s going to take time and a lot of it. But each day is a little bit of a step up, rather than a leap further down”. Love and prayers, Karen xx

I simply cannot express how amazing I think you are to do this. I suffered severely with Pnd around 6 months after son was born. I had a bad birth experience which I had felt extreme fear and lack of sleep for a week just after he was born. I was separated from him to receive and recover from an operation which was so scary. I think during my pregnancy looking back this is when it started. I had hips dysplacia and never slept! I found health professionals let me down and It still brings tears to my eyes when I think back to the desperation of how I felt each time I went to see my doctor! And each time I was sent away without any help or advice and just some pills. No follow up call or appointment and no referral. No chat longer than 2 minutes in surgery and no advice leaflet of what I may have been facing. I will never ever forget the fear and dispair that I felt. The darkness and a feeling of being outside my body looking down at my husband and son. My saviour was my own determination to figure out what was wrong with me. And secondly was from a website forum that listed girls going through exactly the same thing and were just as frightened as me. With those two things I was able to educate myself and family. Which in turn meant they could start to support me. Finally I paid privately for therapy as my gp firstly told me I couldn’t have therapy referral through nhs while I was on meds. After 3rd request I was added to list but 8 weeks would have been too late. My therapist whom I ended up paying private for…he saved my life! And regardless of whether it was his job or not, I will always be grateful for the time he gave me well over and above session times when I was at my most dark.
I think you are so brave to fight and be so open. You have no idea how your blog would have most definitely changed my life those few years ago if I’d have found it. And to think there are mums out there the same as me but maybe with less family support, medical insurance to help get therapy earlier or the same determination to get better. It’s those that need those in-patient facilities at The Ulster Hospital. They need the support groups. They need the forums, the advice leaflets and most of all, their GP to have at least some understanding of this illness.

So lovely of you to get in touch and to share your story. You have been through so much. I am so glad that you found someone to help you. I agree, we need to do so much more to help mums who are struggling and I am determined to continue raising awareness and seeing if we can improve the support available. I am hearing too many stories, like mine and yours, where Mums are feeling let down and not heard. Keep in touch and thanks again for sharing – it’s very brave of you to share you thoughts and experience! xxx